Sooo, what’s been going on over at “Audio Book Heaven?” I’m glad you asked!
Ro confirmed for me that the counter is working. That was pretty exciting because I didn’t think I'd ever get it. At StatCounter.com they provide you with some raw html code and you have to copy it and paste it into your website to create the counter. I was having a lot of trouble figuring out exactly where the code started and ended and that’s why I had so much trouble getting the counter to work. At Amazon's affiliate website, when they provide html code for you, there's a button right below it. When you click the button, it automatically highlights the code and copies it to the clipboard. That is so much easier! I sent a message to Stat Counter and told them they should consider adding a feature like that.
Speaking of Amazon, I’ve got their affiliate program figured out and I’ve started putting the links in my book reviews. They have a system where you can look up a specific product on Amazon and they will generate the code that will link directly to that item. So on each of my book reviews, there will be a link directly to that book at Amazon if anyone wants to click over and buy it. I originally envisioned a generic link so that I could just copy the same link on each book review. That would have been a lot easier, but those links only come in banner form. I’m not really sure if screen readers can manage banner ads or not so I decided against that. The individual product links come in plain text form that screen readers will have no problem with.
I’m still having a little trouble with Audible. I actually have a generic link set up, but I want to do product links just like with Amazon. For some reason it's not working, though. I've been emailing back and forth with their help desk to see if we can figure out why. I’m using the generic links for now, but I hope to get the product links working soon.
I looked around at the ABE Books affiliate page, but I had a really hard time navigating their pages so I decided to drop that one. They're just not set up very well for screen readers.
So that’s about it. Everything is up and running, I just have a few little details to iron out. I’ve set myself a goal of publishing a new book review on every odd-numbered day throughout the month of May. I'll have to scramble a little, but I think I can do it. Stay tuned!
Psalms 42:11 Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
Showing posts with label amazon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label amazon. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Journal - Customer Service
Busy, busy, busy! "Audio Book Heaven" is all ready to go as far as the settings and layout are concerned. That table of contents I created is proving to be very handy. As part of my book reviews, I’ve begun adding a section called "Related Books" where I list other books from the series, etcetera. The books in the list are linked to other reviews if I’ve already done one. The table of contents makes it much easier for me to make the links. I hope my readers find it useful too, assuming I ever get any. ~smile~
On the Audible program, I’ve finally been approved as an affiliate. They had previously denied my application because I had put the wrong URL on it. That’s been fixed and I’m all set to go. I started looking through the different links they have that you can put on your website. I sort of want to modify the wording a little bit to fit my blog a little better, but I thought I should ask them first. So I sent an email to ask about that and I’m waiting for their response.
I also have an account set up with Amazon. They have some different things you can do, you can link to individual products or to product categories. I just got done emailing them some questions about that. I think it would be better to link to a category, namely books, but I asked them what would happen if someone clicked my link and then bought something in a different category. Also, it seemed like all they had were banners, so I asked if they had text links available. We’ll see what they say.
I also heard about another affiliate program with ABE Books. They sell new and used books, although I’m not sure if they handle audio books. I’ll give that a look sometime, my reviews are written from and for audio books but they would still apply to text books for the most part.
I’m still kind of playing around with the stat counter thing. Not having much luck though. I’ve heard of people having trouble not being able to see their own counters, although people on other computers can see them. So if you go to "Audio Book Heaven", let me know if you see a counter at the bottom of the page. I think it’s at the bottom anyway.
That’s it for now. See ya later!
Update! I just got an email back from Audible where I had asked if I could modify the link. The rep asked for an example of what I wanted it to say so I showed her what I wanted. I must say, the various people I’ve been contacting at Audible, Amazon, WordPress, and Stat-Counter have all been very good about getting back to me quickly. They've also been very friendly and helpful. It's nice to know that there are still friendly customer service reps somewhere out there.
Ephesians 4:32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
2 Peter 1:7 and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love.
On the Audible program, I’ve finally been approved as an affiliate. They had previously denied my application because I had put the wrong URL on it. That’s been fixed and I’m all set to go. I started looking through the different links they have that you can put on your website. I sort of want to modify the wording a little bit to fit my blog a little better, but I thought I should ask them first. So I sent an email to ask about that and I’m waiting for their response.
I also have an account set up with Amazon. They have some different things you can do, you can link to individual products or to product categories. I just got done emailing them some questions about that. I think it would be better to link to a category, namely books, but I asked them what would happen if someone clicked my link and then bought something in a different category. Also, it seemed like all they had were banners, so I asked if they had text links available. We’ll see what they say.
I also heard about another affiliate program with ABE Books. They sell new and used books, although I’m not sure if they handle audio books. I’ll give that a look sometime, my reviews are written from and for audio books but they would still apply to text books for the most part.
I’m still kind of playing around with the stat counter thing. Not having much luck though. I’ve heard of people having trouble not being able to see their own counters, although people on other computers can see them. So if you go to "Audio Book Heaven", let me know if you see a counter at the bottom of the page. I think it’s at the bottom anyway.
That’s it for now. See ya later!
Update! I just got an email back from Audible where I had asked if I could modify the link. The rep asked for an example of what I wanted it to say so I showed her what I wanted. I must say, the various people I’ve been contacting at Audible, Amazon, WordPress, and Stat-Counter have all been very good about getting back to me quickly. They've also been very friendly and helpful. It's nice to know that there are still friendly customer service reps somewhere out there.
Ephesians 4:32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
2 Peter 1:7 and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Journal - Widgets and Stuff
Okay, I’m falling a little bit behind on my updates. So where was I?
I already mentioned that I had finally figured out the big problem with my blog and not being able to post hyperlinks. Once that was out of the way, I was able to move on with creating my new book review blog. By then, however, I had changed my mind about the title. I decided I liked “Audio Book Heaven” better than “Critical Mass Media.” So I changed everything over again. That's actually pretty easy to do so it was no big deal.
Once I had my audio book reviews imported to “Audio Book Heaven", it was time to add some widgets. For those of you who are not bloggers, widgets are the little boxes of information on the right side of the screen. I never realized what a poor selection of widgets Blogger has. When I was poking around over at WordPress, I found lots of really useful widgets, but here at Blogger it's mostly garbage like "Cute Kitten Photo of the Day”, and “Mister T Quote of the Day.” I couldn’t really find anything that was very useful, so I started making up my own. At WordPress, there’s a widget that displays your most popular blog posts, based on how many hits each of your pages gets. Blogger doesn’t keep stats so that was impossible to do. Instead I just created a list of my own and linked the list to the ten posts I chose. Next I wanted a complete list of all my book reviews so viewers could pick any book off the list and read the review, table of contents style. Blogger doesn’t have anything like that either, so again, I created my own. I created a list of all my reviews and posted it on the blog like a normal post. Then in a widget, I linked to that post. Not quite what I wanted, but passable.
I’m still working on the affiliate programs. I can’t remember how much of this I already talked about. I tried to sign up for the affiliate program at Audible dot com, but I couldn’t manage their CAPCHA. That one didn’t even have a listen link. I emailed them about it and they referred me to Commission Junction, which is the service they’ve contracted with to handle the program. In other words, they gave me the brush-off. I emailed them right back and basically said look, you hired these people to handle the program and what they do reflects back on you, good or bad. So one of the Audible reps emailed me again and said she had contacted CJ to see what they could do. CJ said I could call them on the phone and they could sign me up that way. So I got signed up for the program. Then a few days later, I saw that Audible had denied my application. Yesterday I emailed them again to ask why. I emailed that same rep that helped me before. She asked for my account number and the URL of my site and she would look into it. I sent her that information today so I’m waiting to see what will happen. I haven’t actually signed up with Amazon yet, I’ve just had too many things going on.
I’m still thinking about running a blog over at WordPress, maybe a mirror of my book reviews. I really like what I’ve seen there. Oh, I almost forgot. I think I mentioned earlier how their widgets could only be added by clicking and dragging with the mouse. Well, I emailed them about that and the rep told me about a setting I could change to turn on the accessibility options. She said that would give the widgets an add/edit button just like the ones here at Blogger. Immediately after that, the rep sent me a second email saying that she wasn’t sure if my screen reader would get me to the accessibility options, so she had gone ahead and turned it on for me. How’s that for customer service? Anyway, WordPress has the built-in stats, good widgets, and it looks like you can set it up to automatically put an entry on your Facebook wall every time you post something. That sounds pretty awesome. Once I get things squared away here, I may give that a try.
Okay, I think that’s everything I wanted to mention. See you next time.
Hebrews 12:28-29 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our "God is a consuming fire."
I already mentioned that I had finally figured out the big problem with my blog and not being able to post hyperlinks. Once that was out of the way, I was able to move on with creating my new book review blog. By then, however, I had changed my mind about the title. I decided I liked “Audio Book Heaven” better than “Critical Mass Media.” So I changed everything over again. That's actually pretty easy to do so it was no big deal.
Once I had my audio book reviews imported to “Audio Book Heaven", it was time to add some widgets. For those of you who are not bloggers, widgets are the little boxes of information on the right side of the screen. I never realized what a poor selection of widgets Blogger has. When I was poking around over at WordPress, I found lots of really useful widgets, but here at Blogger it's mostly garbage like "Cute Kitten Photo of the Day”, and “Mister T Quote of the Day.” I couldn’t really find anything that was very useful, so I started making up my own. At WordPress, there’s a widget that displays your most popular blog posts, based on how many hits each of your pages gets. Blogger doesn’t keep stats so that was impossible to do. Instead I just created a list of my own and linked the list to the ten posts I chose. Next I wanted a complete list of all my book reviews so viewers could pick any book off the list and read the review, table of contents style. Blogger doesn’t have anything like that either, so again, I created my own. I created a list of all my reviews and posted it on the blog like a normal post. Then in a widget, I linked to that post. Not quite what I wanted, but passable.
I’m still working on the affiliate programs. I can’t remember how much of this I already talked about. I tried to sign up for the affiliate program at Audible dot com, but I couldn’t manage their CAPCHA. That one didn’t even have a listen link. I emailed them about it and they referred me to Commission Junction, which is the service they’ve contracted with to handle the program. In other words, they gave me the brush-off. I emailed them right back and basically said look, you hired these people to handle the program and what they do reflects back on you, good or bad. So one of the Audible reps emailed me again and said she had contacted CJ to see what they could do. CJ said I could call them on the phone and they could sign me up that way. So I got signed up for the program. Then a few days later, I saw that Audible had denied my application. Yesterday I emailed them again to ask why. I emailed that same rep that helped me before. She asked for my account number and the URL of my site and she would look into it. I sent her that information today so I’m waiting to see what will happen. I haven’t actually signed up with Amazon yet, I’ve just had too many things going on.
I’m still thinking about running a blog over at WordPress, maybe a mirror of my book reviews. I really like what I’ve seen there. Oh, I almost forgot. I think I mentioned earlier how their widgets could only be added by clicking and dragging with the mouse. Well, I emailed them about that and the rep told me about a setting I could change to turn on the accessibility options. She said that would give the widgets an add/edit button just like the ones here at Blogger. Immediately after that, the rep sent me a second email saying that she wasn’t sure if my screen reader would get me to the accessibility options, so she had gone ahead and turned it on for me. How’s that for customer service? Anyway, WordPress has the built-in stats, good widgets, and it looks like you can set it up to automatically put an entry on your Facebook wall every time you post something. That sounds pretty awesome. Once I get things squared away here, I may give that a try.
Okay, I think that’s everything I wanted to mention. See you next time.
Hebrews 12:28-29 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our "God is a consuming fire."
Monday, April 19, 2010
Journal - Critical Mass
Well, I haven’t written anything for a while, as you can see. I’m starting to get a little bored with the whole blogging thing. That's how I am, I find something new that interests me and I put a lot of time and effort into it for a while, but I always end up getting bored with it eventually. That’s one reason why I always found it so difficult to settle down with one job for very long.
This time it has been kind of weird. I’m bored with the blogs, but I don’t want to be bored with them. I want to keep doing it because it was really fun for a while. Bonus points to anyone who can explain that. So anyway, instead of just giving up on the blogs altogether, I decided to try and shake things up a little bit.
What I decided to do is come up with a new name for my audio book review blog, “Reviews From The Deep.” But that was too easy, so instead of just renaming it, I decided to create a whole new blog with the new name so it would have a new URL and everything. And that’s just what I did. My new audio book blog is called “Critical Mass Media, Audio Book Meltdown.” Since it was an all new blog, I wanted to put some different gadgets on it and do a few different things with it. So far, it has proven to be very challenging, which is a good thing because that will keep me interested for a while.
The first step was creating the blog. A simple enough task, unless you happen to be blind. To create a new blog, you have to complete a verification. It’s a little box with some letters and numbers in it and you have to type out what you see there. It’s called a CAPCHA I think, although I don’t know where that name comes from. Maybe Ro will tell us. They do that so you can prove that you are a human being and ot some auto-spammer. They have a little thing you can click on if you’re blind so you can hear the numbers instead of seeing them, but they never work. Until now, that is. When I got to the CAPCHA, I clicked the listen link and I could actually hear the numbers and type them out as it played. It really worked! I was very pleased about that and was off to a good start on my new blog.
The next step was to export all of the book reviews from my old blog, and then import them to the new one. That step was pretty easy, there are links to click on to export and import. Basically it’s just saving a file to my computer’s hard drive, and then opening it back up from the new blog. No problem there, all of my book reviews showed up with the comments still attached and everything.
Now I wanted to put some fancy gadgets on my new blog, namely a counter, and a drop-down list box for the labels. These are not standard gadgets that are available through blogger, but can be added by adding some raw html code. I ran into some trouble there. I spent about five hours working on those two things and got absolutely nowhere. That’s pretty frustrating because things like that used to be pretty easy for me. Not to worry, I’ll keep working on it.
Also, I ran into another problem. About the time I created my new blog, something that I use a lot quit working. To create links in a blog post, I use the keyboard shortcut "ctrl-shift-a." Suddenly that stopped working and I get some funny warning message when I try it. I think that some security setting in Internet Explorer has changed, but I haven't found out which one yet. I put a message in the help forum about it but haven’t gotten a reply yet. I'm going to do some research on that as soon as I'm done posting this. Anyway, that's why I couldn't provide a link to “Critical Mass Media” here. No big deal, the blog isn’t ready to be looked at yet anyway.
So those are the things I need to figure out. After that, the next step will be monetizing the new blog. Monetizing is a fancy name for using your blog to make money. Since I’m writing audio book reviews, I want to link them to websites that actually sell the books and get a percentage of the sale in return. That's called an affiliate partnership and both Audible.com and Amazon.com have affiliate programs. I'll have to figure out how that whole thing works, that's kind of new to me.
So that’s what I’ve been doing for the last several days. So far so good, my interest in blogs has been rekindled. For now, at least. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.
Ecclesiastes 1:3-9 What does man gain from all his labor at which he toils under the sun? Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again. All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
This time it has been kind of weird. I’m bored with the blogs, but I don’t want to be bored with them. I want to keep doing it because it was really fun for a while. Bonus points to anyone who can explain that. So anyway, instead of just giving up on the blogs altogether, I decided to try and shake things up a little bit.
What I decided to do is come up with a new name for my audio book review blog, “Reviews From The Deep.” But that was too easy, so instead of just renaming it, I decided to create a whole new blog with the new name so it would have a new URL and everything. And that’s just what I did. My new audio book blog is called “Critical Mass Media, Audio Book Meltdown.” Since it was an all new blog, I wanted to put some different gadgets on it and do a few different things with it. So far, it has proven to be very challenging, which is a good thing because that will keep me interested for a while.
The first step was creating the blog. A simple enough task, unless you happen to be blind. To create a new blog, you have to complete a verification. It’s a little box with some letters and numbers in it and you have to type out what you see there. It’s called a CAPCHA I think, although I don’t know where that name comes from. Maybe Ro will tell us. They do that so you can prove that you are a human being and ot some auto-spammer. They have a little thing you can click on if you’re blind so you can hear the numbers instead of seeing them, but they never work. Until now, that is. When I got to the CAPCHA, I clicked the listen link and I could actually hear the numbers and type them out as it played. It really worked! I was very pleased about that and was off to a good start on my new blog.
The next step was to export all of the book reviews from my old blog, and then import them to the new one. That step was pretty easy, there are links to click on to export and import. Basically it’s just saving a file to my computer’s hard drive, and then opening it back up from the new blog. No problem there, all of my book reviews showed up with the comments still attached and everything.
Now I wanted to put some fancy gadgets on my new blog, namely a counter, and a drop-down list box for the labels. These are not standard gadgets that are available through blogger, but can be added by adding some raw html code. I ran into some trouble there. I spent about five hours working on those two things and got absolutely nowhere. That’s pretty frustrating because things like that used to be pretty easy for me. Not to worry, I’ll keep working on it.
Also, I ran into another problem. About the time I created my new blog, something that I use a lot quit working. To create links in a blog post, I use the keyboard shortcut "ctrl-shift-a." Suddenly that stopped working and I get some funny warning message when I try it. I think that some security setting in Internet Explorer has changed, but I haven't found out which one yet. I put a message in the help forum about it but haven’t gotten a reply yet. I'm going to do some research on that as soon as I'm done posting this. Anyway, that's why I couldn't provide a link to “Critical Mass Media” here. No big deal, the blog isn’t ready to be looked at yet anyway.
So those are the things I need to figure out. After that, the next step will be monetizing the new blog. Monetizing is a fancy name for using your blog to make money. Since I’m writing audio book reviews, I want to link them to websites that actually sell the books and get a percentage of the sale in return. That's called an affiliate partnership and both Audible.com and Amazon.com have affiliate programs. I'll have to figure out how that whole thing works, that's kind of new to me.
So that’s what I’ve been doing for the last several days. So far so good, my interest in blogs has been rekindled. For now, at least. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.
Ecclesiastes 1:3-9 What does man gain from all his labor at which he toils under the sun? Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again. All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Journal - Happy Birthday!
Wow! It’s a landmark day for Drums In The Deep! This is the first time I’ve posted twice in one day. Ensign Ro will be so proud of me!
Well, I was up late last night getting some things off my chest. And I must say, after that I went to bed and slept very soundly until about 7:30 this morning. Things always look better in the light of day, even if you can’t see the light, so to speak. Also, I got a couple of very thought-provoking comments on last night’s post. So I’m feeling a little better about things this morning. Also, I can’t be down today because IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!
Yup, I’m 39 today, and it’s shaping up to be a good day. I had lots of nice things in my email this morning; blog comments, birthday wishes from Facebook, an e-card from Aunt LeeDel, and a birthday email from Mom. Joni is off to Kearney to get my birthday socks. I love getting new socks, and I look forward to them all year. Last years’ socks really took a beating. Since I haven’t been working, I haven’t been wearing shoes very much so my socks are all worn out. Also, Joni is bringing home McDonald’s for lunch. A couple of days ago, I saw a commercial for a new burger they have; the 1/3 pound angus burger! Well, let me tell you, I’ve been dying to try one ever since I saw it so that’s what I’m getting for my birthday. Also we’ll get some of the Coke glasses they’re giving with the value meals. That will be nice because since going blind, I’ve broken all our glasses. We all have to use plastic cups now.
So I just wanted to post something happy today to balance out the more somber post of last night. After I finish this I’m going to practice on my sax for a while. Which reminds me! I’m so excited, Joni and I are having the family over on the 19th for a little pre-Christmas get-together. We’re going to have supper and then I’m going to play some Christmas music.
As an early birthday present last week, Joni let me download some new karaoke songs. At Amazon.com, you can buy and download individual songs for 99 cents each. I think that’s a great deal instead of buying a whole CD that has maybe 1 or 2 good songs on it. So I got 10 new Christmas songs. Some of them are really difficult so I’ve been working really hard on them. I’m excited about it because my family has done so much for me this year, and I know it’s not much, but this is how I can say thanks.
One more thing and then I’m out of here. It’s cold! Joni said it was 10 degrees this morning. Am I missing Texas? Well, I miss the weather, I know that much. I’ll take 100 degree summers over this anytime! Now if I could just get my family to move down there!
Isn’t that amazing? Just a few hours ago I was all depressed, but I prayed about it and God lifted my spirits! And he used all of my favorite people to do it!
Okay, gott ago practice. See ya later!
Psalms 31:7 I will be glad and rejoice in thy mercy: for thou hast considered my trouble; thou hast known my soul in adversities;
Well, I was up late last night getting some things off my chest. And I must say, after that I went to bed and slept very soundly until about 7:30 this morning. Things always look better in the light of day, even if you can’t see the light, so to speak. Also, I got a couple of very thought-provoking comments on last night’s post. So I’m feeling a little better about things this morning. Also, I can’t be down today because IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!
Yup, I’m 39 today, and it’s shaping up to be a good day. I had lots of nice things in my email this morning; blog comments, birthday wishes from Facebook, an e-card from Aunt LeeDel, and a birthday email from Mom. Joni is off to Kearney to get my birthday socks. I love getting new socks, and I look forward to them all year. Last years’ socks really took a beating. Since I haven’t been working, I haven’t been wearing shoes very much so my socks are all worn out. Also, Joni is bringing home McDonald’s for lunch. A couple of days ago, I saw a commercial for a new burger they have; the 1/3 pound angus burger! Well, let me tell you, I’ve been dying to try one ever since I saw it so that’s what I’m getting for my birthday. Also we’ll get some of the Coke glasses they’re giving with the value meals. That will be nice because since going blind, I’ve broken all our glasses. We all have to use plastic cups now.
So I just wanted to post something happy today to balance out the more somber post of last night. After I finish this I’m going to practice on my sax for a while. Which reminds me! I’m so excited, Joni and I are having the family over on the 19th for a little pre-Christmas get-together. We’re going to have supper and then I’m going to play some Christmas music.
As an early birthday present last week, Joni let me download some new karaoke songs. At Amazon.com, you can buy and download individual songs for 99 cents each. I think that’s a great deal instead of buying a whole CD that has maybe 1 or 2 good songs on it. So I got 10 new Christmas songs. Some of them are really difficult so I’ve been working really hard on them. I’m excited about it because my family has done so much for me this year, and I know it’s not much, but this is how I can say thanks.
One more thing and then I’m out of here. It’s cold! Joni said it was 10 degrees this morning. Am I missing Texas? Well, I miss the weather, I know that much. I’ll take 100 degree summers over this anytime! Now if I could just get my family to move down there!
Isn’t that amazing? Just a few hours ago I was all depressed, but I prayed about it and God lifted my spirits! And he used all of my favorite people to do it!
Okay, gott ago practice. See ya later!
Psalms 31:7 I will be glad and rejoice in thy mercy: for thou hast considered my trouble; thou hast known my soul in adversities;
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)